The Blue of Morning
by AlwaysKatie7
Summary: After Joffrey's wedding, Jaime reflects on the father he was never able to be and the oaths he has failed to keep. Brienne is there to comfort him, for reasons.* (*Reason one being she's in love with him reason two being I want her to be there and I wrote it!)


A/N: I'm new to Game of Thrones but I started watching it because I saw the Jaime x Brienne gifs on tumblr and now I'm deep in the hole. That says everything you need to know about me. Currently I'm on season 5 (R.I.P. my main girl Shireen you deserved so much better!), but also I use social media so I know how this dumpster fire ends and am pre-upset about it! I'm also about to start the books so you can probably expect more fics from me in the future.

I truly don't know why I wrote this particular story. Not much happens, fair warning. I just thought it was low-key devastating watching Jaime cradle his demon son as he died and wanted to do a one shot about him afterwards to block out what the writers actually had him do afterwards...you know the scene I'm talking about.

* * *

From the platform where he'd spent countless early mornings training his one remaining hand against Bronn's two good ones, tucked into a hillside above the sea, Jaime Lannister watched as the sun sank below the horizon, and prayed that the day that was ending had been nothing more than a bad dream from which he would soon awaken.

That morning, when he and Tyrion's sellsword had sparred there with their blunt swords, and Bronn had gotten the better of him not one, nor two, but three times, leaving Jaime panting and sweaty and finally forced to agree to a moment's rest from their training—the sky had been a striking, consuming shade of blue. He never paid much attention to the sky, normally, but that morning it'd demanded to be noticed. Bright, unwavering blue, the color of promise. The color of Brienne's eyes, he'd thought at the time, as the image of her flickered across his mind suddenly, persistent and lingering until Bronn called out to him and he'd finally managed to push it aside. He'd had other, more important things to focus on. It had, after all, been the morning of his son's wedding.

The king's marriage banquet was meant to be the grandest event the seven kingdoms had seen in some hundred years—a royal wedding above and beyond all royal weddings that had come before it. Though it was Joffrey Baratheon wedding Margarey Tyrell, the joining of their houses had become entirely a Lannister affair. This meant that, above all, the banquet served as an excuse for an unabashed display of wealth—the excessive, gross wealth the powerful liked to flaunt in order to convince other people, or perhaps just themselves, of their own superiority. Golden goblets were filled to their brims with the finest wines, golden platters were packed overflowing with a feast large enough to feed all the poor in King's Landing for at least a week, possibly more. And at the center of the party, rising above the scarlet-draped tables, was the golden head of a lion, with a mouth that opened to reveal the evening's many entertainments, if one could call Joffrey's preferred crescendo of humiliation and mockery by such a name.

Now, hours later in the early evening, the sky itself was ablaze, instantly grander than anything the Lannisters had been able to manufacture during the day. Orange, yellow and red were streaked across a darkening sky in a final burst of color and daylight before all went black, like the coals of a persistent fire slowly being snuffed out into nothing.

Now, his eldest son was dead.

His sister kept watch over the body. She refused to leave, even after Jaime had urged her, begged her even, to get some rest, for her own sake.

His brother had been dragged into a cell beneath the red keep and charged with the king's death, a charge that had become more damning in wake of Sansa Stark's sudden and mysterious disappearance.

And he, Jaime, had come here, to watch the sun sink beside the sea.

Bronn had assured him once that few knew of this place, and Jaime could only hope the sellsword knew well of what he spoke. The absolute last thing he wanted was to be disturbed, for he was currently exerting the full brunt of his mental energy into erasing the image of dark red blood seeping from the corners of his firstborn's eyes as the child had choked to death. It was the most gruesome death Jaime had ever witnessed, not because of the method of killing, for he had seen far worse, but because it was his child who was being killed, right before his eyes, and he had been powerless to stop it. At the moment, he couldn't help but wonder (ridiculously, for why think of her now?) if Catelyn Stark had felt the same way, the same deep hopelessness and utter despair as she had watched her own firstborn, Robb, crumble before her, and known it was over. He wondered, also, if when her own time had come moments later, she had welcomed her end with open arms, as he half wished to.

The sunset was fading now to make room for the stars that would soon replace it in the darkness. The waves of the sea crashed against the jagged rocks below. For the briefest of moments, Jaime watched the water break against the rocks' edge and wondered what it would be to let himself fall from such a height and allow death to engulf him. It felt as though he had been holding it at bay for years, barely at an arm's length. Jaime had been locked in conflict with death since the time he was seventeen; as kingsguard, as Kingslayer, a man without honor, as Robb Stark's prisoner, and, most recently, as a one-handed, bleeding invalid, with an infected stump of an arm. Looking at the sea, he decided that this, by comparison, would be an almost easy death: one sudden impact, then nothing. A peaceful end. Far different, he imagined, from Joffrey's distorted face and desperately grasping hands, clawing at an invisible noose around his neck, reaching blindly for his mother….

"Ser Jaime?" a soft voice spoke from behind him. He jumped as the sound broke him out of his reverie. It was Brienne's voice. He should have known she'd look for him, and known she'd find him, as well. The wench seemed to have a knack for making herself present where she was not wanted. You are too harsh, his conscience reprehended, though for once he hadn't spoken the snide remark aloud. He shook his inner voice away as he always did, pivoted his person enough to nod at her once in recognition, and went back to staring at the sea.

Brienne took the opportunity to come closer, and he felt, more than saw, her come up beside him. She, too, seemed to be watching the sun set over the water. Her eyes did not so much as gloss over him as she spoke, but her words were clear and firm, piercing through him in a way that her eyes did not. "You should be at the castle," she said to the air, "instead of out here, standing too close to the edge." There was an infliction in her voice when she said it that made him take one step back, just enough to appease her. Still, he said nothing. They stood in silence for some time. "Tell me about him," Brienne prompted at last.

"Who?" asked Jaime, though of course he knew who.

"Your son."

"I have no sons." It was the old lie, one he had been speaking into existence for 18 years now. When he said it to Brienne, it felt feeble in a way it never had before.

"Fine," Brienne said bluntly, changing tact, "Your nephew, then. King Joffrey. Tell me about him."

For some time, Jaime remained silent. Perhaps it was because he had nothing to say. Or perhaps, more likely, it was because he'd been denied from speaking freely about his children for so long that he had too much to say, but no idea how to form the right words. He tried desperately to recall his son in his head as he had been in life, but he couldn't seem to piece together a singular, robust image. There were too many versions of the boy floating around in his memory, all conflicting, pushing in against one another. There was Joffrey the wailing babe, Joffrey the presumptuous, giddy boy, Joffrey the entitled man, the brutal king. Then there was Joffrey the powerless, the pitiful, the doomed: the Joffrey of the end. The pained, helpless face who had stared up at Cersei in its last moments; that was there, too. "It is true, what everyone whispers but refuses to say outright for fear," he whispered finally, "Joffrey was a cruel king. He was unfit to wear the crown."

"I don't want you to tell me what kind of king he was. I want you to—"

"—He was a cruel man, too," Jaime continued, as if Brienne had never interrupted. He thought of Joffrey forcing Tyrion to endure humiliation after humiliation in front of a crowd of party guests. He thought of Sansa Stark's young, unmarked face, painted in equal measure with anger and fright, poorly concealed beneath a mask of attempted indifference as she looked toward the king. He saw, as plainly as if he were witnessing it now, little Tommen flinch each time Joffrey drew his sword, and Cersei, yes even Cersei, hold her breath each time Joffrey uttered a command. "…And yet."

"And yet you loved him," Brienne finished softly.

He gave one, sharp nod. "And yet I loved him."

It was only then that the Lady of Tarth looked at him, and only then that he looked back at her. He had been right, earlier. It was just as he remembered. Her eyes may have reflected the sapphire blue of Tarth's waters, but here in King's Landing they were the blue of the early morning, the blue of promise. Somehow, the thought calmed him, but only momentarily, for Brienne's eyes were at the moment a little too penetrating, filled with too much understanding. It was the same look she had given him in the Harrenhal baths, and in the end he was forced to look away. "What else?" she prompted him.

There was so much that could be said, but he found himself going back to the very start. "I was there when he was born," he admitted, "Robert was away hunting. He was always hunting when Cersei went into labor, except for the first time, the time their child died. After that he went away, always. But I insisted on being in the room, with her."

Brienne noticeably flinched. The one topic he had rarely spoken of to her was Cersei, but his twin sister was always present nonetheless, laced in the undertones of all of their conversations, sitting like a brick barrier between himself and her, invisible but impenetrable all the same. He powered on. "Cersei was so glad I was there, so glad I'd forced them to let me stay even when the maester insisted I leave for the birthing. She was scared, though she'd never admit it now. She was afraid that this child would fade quickly, too, as her first had. Only this time it would be worse because it was my child now, instead of his. She thought I was there to comfort her. But the truth is, I only half did it for her. Oh, I did want to be there for her; of course I did. But in plain truth I did it for him, because I was scared, too."

He shut his eyes to block out even the impending darkness of the night, and thought back desperately to the first time he'd watched Cersei give birth. Little Joffrey had come out kicking and screaming, covered in his mother's blood, and he'd immediately started to wail at the world. His cries had filled Jaime with the first true happiness of his life. For Joffrey was whole, ten fingers and ten tiny toes, two little eyes clapped shut, and a tiny voice already learning how to roar. And he was theirs, though the child would never know it. He was Cersei and Jaime's flesh and blood, both. And he was perfect. "It is impossible to love my sister without fearing her also," Jaime admitted softly. He could feel Brienne's eyes on him even with his own tightly closed, "but that was the one time I remember being truly, truly afraid of what she might do. I was afraid that, should the child be like Tyrion—for I'd heard such things can be passed down amongst kin—Cersei might demand that he be taken away and killed, as my father had once thought of doing to my brother." And, likely, as he plans to do now, Jaime thought bitterly, thinking of his brother wasting in a dark cell. "Cersei would never tolerate any presumed weakness, not in someone she claimed as hers." He glanced down, briefly, at the golden hand she'd had made for him to mask his own weakness, so that she could pretend that he was still whole. He clenched his other hand. "So, I went to the birthing room in case I needed to save him. And I told myself I would always save him. Thatwas my role. I could never be a father to him, but I could save him. Protect him from harm." He tried desperately to choke back the sob that threatened to escape him, but his voice cracked and gave him away. Brienne's fingers brushed his own, just briefly enough to make him question if he had only imagined it. He opened his eyes. The sun had disappeared entirely. The sky was now black.

"In the end there is no way to save a man from himself, Ser Jaime. King Joffrey could not be saved, by you nor anyone else."

He shook his head, not believing her, cursing himself against her words. He should have done more! He should have paid closer attention. He should have been able to keep his word. He wanted to keep one oath in his lifetime, if only one, if only an oath he'd sworn to himself. But he couldn't manage even that. He shook his head. "I didn't know what he would become, then. It is one thing to have feared the extent of my sister's hatred; I still didn't know what it was to fear my own child. But I grew to learn." There was a sharp intake of breath from his side, but Brienne said nothing.

Jaime clamped his eyes shut again and tried again to picture Joffrey. He did not consider himself an especially pious man, but when each of his children had been born, he had prayed to the gods that they would not be like their parents, and the spiteful gods, if they existed, had granted him his wish only in the twisted way that gods do. His children, all three of them, were like their parents only in their looks. Joffrey had grown into a man far more rash and impulsive than his father and much crueler than his mother. All the fondness Jaime had once had for the boy, in his youth, had long ago disappeared. With every passing year he became more unbearable, and he only seemed to grow more twisted with each rotation round the sun. Jaime had always known it, but he had become more conscious of it since his recent return to King's Landing; in his lengthy absence Joffrey had grown from an arrogant and unpleasant prince into a dangerous king—as dangerous, perhaps, as Aerys Targaryen. Yet Joffrey was not mad, as Aerys had been, a fact which, if anything, only made him more dangerous still. For Joffrey was as deliberate as he was scornful and sadistic. He took pleasure in pain in ways beyond even his mother and grandfather's imaginings. Cersei had once confessed to him, as they shared a bed, that Joffrey felt like a punishment from the gods for their sins. The child was the inevitable product of its parent's unnatural relations. His crimes were merely an extension of their own.

If so, Jaime thought, Myrcella and Tommen must be his atonement. For his second and third children were as unlike their parents as his first, but in all the right ways. Myrcella was a fighter, but not with a sword like him or with clever words like Cersei. She had a different, inner strength, a sort of quiet resilience that had always surprised and impressed him. When Jaime had returned to King's Landing, Tyrion had told him that when Myrcella was sent away to meet the unfamiliar Dornish boy who happened to be her newly betrothed, she had climbed into the boat without a single tear on her face. His daughter was gentle and kind, but she was not weak or helpless. She was intelligent and brave, all the best traits of her Lannister blood with none of the bad. Tommen, meanwhile, was naïve and quiet and easily emotional. But he was eager to learn and willing to grow, and it filled Jaime with pride to watch him eagerly devour Tyrion's books, one after another. Tommen, like his sister, was kind-hearted. They had beaten the odds, as Tyrion liked to say. They were good children—proof that what he and Cersei had between them wasn't only destructive.

But the gods had been sure to have the last laugh, hadn't they? Now Tommen was to become king. For all of Joffrey's faults, Jaime had at least felt certain that the crown wouldn't eat his first son alive from the inside out. Joffrey had corroded long before the crown was placed upon his head. With Tommen, Jaime wasn't so sure. His youngest son was a true innocent, far different from his brother. The boy was barely 14 years old. He was too trusting, too emotional. He didn't fully understand the extent of power the iron throne gave him, let alone know how to use it. And Jaime knew his own sister and father. Together, Cersei and Tywin would eat the boy alive. Oh, Cersei might not realize she was doing it. He had no doubt in his mind that his sister's children were everything to her, and she would do everything in her power to keep Tommen whole and safe and happy. But she would also make sure she held on to the real power. She would rule through Tommen, as their father would, and the two of them would each make their own decisions and then manipulate the boy king into thinking they were the right ones.

Jaime hated that throne. The throne King Aerys would burn his people to the ground to keep, if only it meant he could remain ruler of the ashes left behind. The throne Jaime himself had sat upon after slicing the mad king through the back, waiting patiently to see who would come to claim it next. But the throne hadn't suited Robert Baratheon, either, who had turned to drunkenness and vulgarity to escape it. Nor Joffrey, who had started a war over it from the moment he took Ned Stark's head. If those men couldn't survive the iron throne, how would little Tommen? Tyrion had always insisted Cersei's one redeeming quality was her love for her children, but Jaime sometimes had to wonder. He simply couldn't understand why Cersei kept fighting to put children, their children, on a throne that would swallow each of them whole, as it had done all of their predecessors.

"I am sorry for your family," Brienne said to him, softly like a whisper, "The king was many things, but he was still only a boy. And our new king will be just a boy, too." Not for the first time, it felt as though Brienne could read his mind.

Jaime felt his cheek grow wet, and realized, angrily, that he was crying. He wiped the tear away hastily and hoped Brienne hadn't seen. "What do you know of it, wench?" he snipped at her, his voice suddenly grown cold, "You have no children to speak of, and probably never will."

Beside him, he felt Brienne tense, and saw her face harden. She seemed to tower over him, then. If he were a smarter man he might even recoil. "And here I thought that neither did you," she said stiffly. "I will let you return to mourning your nephew in peace." She turned and made to leave. Jaime let her get less than five paces before calling after her.

"Wait—" he said, and there was longing in his voice, "Please. Don't go." He hated how vulnerable he sounded. He hated how much he didn't actually want to be alone. But if Brienne left, who else would there be to turn to?

Cersei could not bear to leave their dead son's side, but Jaime could not bear to be beside it. He had scattered from that scene at the first opportunity, and he would not return to it tonight. There was something eerie in the sight of Joffrey's hateful face made still, almost gentle, in death. Besides, Cersei was overcome with grief, which meant mainly that she was hell bent on vengeance, and that was never a good sign. There would be no point in trying to have a real conversation with his sister for some time yet. She couldn't be rational when she was angry.

His only other friend was his brother, whom Cersei had thrown in a cellar. Jaime refused to indulge his sister's insistence that Tyrion had killed their son, but he also didn't know what he'd say to his brother even if he did go and see him. Between their father and Cersei, Tyrion's position was not a particularly good one. Jaime didn't yet see a path forward that didn't involve snapping the lose threads tying their family together neatly in two.

This left Brienne. Brienne, who had sought him out. Who let him speak freely and who was honest in return. Brienne who walked back toward him now and stood beside him again, not mentioning how pathetic he was for begging her to stay right after insulting her. "I-I apologize, Lady Brienne," he fumbled. She jerked her head in acknowledgement, and they moved to sit, side by side, along the rock wall surrounding the platform. For a flickering, brief moment, he wished he could take her hand in his own. Brienne kept her distance.

"I am sorry you had to come to the wedding," he said to break the ice between them, aware that she had probably hated every moment of it, even before the side dish of murder. He could still hear Cersei's sweetly sick voice extending the invitation:The man—or, my apologies, woman—who's returned my dear brother to us has the right to a place at the King's table. You will join us at the wedding banquet, Lady Brienne, on the crown's invitation. The words had barely masked the subtle threat that lay beneath them.

"Will you visit your brother?" Brienne questioned. Jaime swallowed, thinking again of Tyrion alone in the black cells. He'd have to ask Bronn to smuggle him some wine, at the least.

"No. Not yet."

"But you don't think he did it, do you?"

"I know that he did not."

Brienne's eyes narrowed. "And the queen? She won't actually take her own brother to trial, will she?"

Jaime looked at her, a little sadly. He only wished that he could believe her. "That you think so is only a reminder that you do not know my sister well. She's been waiting for an opportunity to do just that for years…Now that one has presented itself that will both avenge her son's death and fulfill her life long goal of getting rid of Tyrion, she will pursue it at full strength." He cowered to think what this would mean for his younger brother.

Brienne was staring at him with a cloud over her eyes. She looked…repulsed, and a little angry. Jaime knew she was thinking of the wedding, and Joffrey's behavior with Tyrion and the wine. He was used to people being disgusted by his family. Hells, most of the time, even he was disgusted by them. But with Brienne, it was only a reminder that they were on opposite sides of this war. They had started as enemies for a reason, and though Brienne had delivered him back to King's Landing as a show of peace, his father and sister were keeping her under close scrutiny. She had served Renly Baratheon and Catelyn Stark both. To Cersei, she was nothing but a threat.

"What will you do next, then?" he voiced, changing the subject, "About your oath to Lady Catelyn. Knowing you, you're still determined to keep it, though I imagine that will be difficult even for you now that the stark girl has gone away."

Very briefly, when they had first realized Sansa Stark was missing, Jaime had indulged the idea that Brienne might have managed to somehow smuggle her out amidst all the chaos. It seemed like the sort of reckless thing Brienne would try to do for the girl. But he'd quickly dismissed the idea. Sansa had been gone before Cersei had finished screaming for Tyrion's head. There was no way that she could have left so quickly without the help of someone who had prior knowledge of the king's impending doom.

Brienne's expression faltered. Jaime could tell she had already thought about this at some length. "I don't know. I at least had one of the girls in my eyesight here. Now they've both gone and I have no idea where. I'm not off to a particularly good start, am I?"

"Arya is probably dead, so there's one of two covered," Jaime reminded her, bluntly but not cruelly. It was matter of fact. The girl had been missing since the day of Ned Stark's execution. He doubted very much that a 12-year-old on her own could have made it very far beyond King's Landing. Then again, he thought, remembering how much Lady Catelyn had surprised him in the end, the Stark women were not to be underestimated. Perhaps there was a chance. Of course, there was no where to begin when it came to finding her. "But there's still hope for Lady Sansa," he continued, looking over at Brienne in consideration. "You could go to her. She can't have gotten very far, there's only so many places they would have taken her. I know her brother's at the wall," he recalled, thinking of the bastard he had spoken to briefly on their last official trip to Winterfell. "And the Starks may be wiped out, but there's still her mother's house, the Tully's."

"Yes, I've thought of all of this already," Brienne said pointedly. "There's just one small detail you're missing: I doubt very much that your sister will let me leave."

Yes, but Cersei is a barrier I can overcome for you, Jaime thought swiftly. It would be relatively easy to convince her to let Brienne go, now that she was distracted by Tyrion, and it would be safer, too. At the moment Cersei was dead set on condemning their brother, but if given the slightest of provocations, who knew whom else she might accuse of playing a role. All of her enemies were better off far away.

The dark sky was now cluttered with stars, and they cast Brienne's face in a soft glow as he looked up at her. He features seemed gentler, more womanly, in such a light. He could help her now, and perhaps it would repay some of the debt he still owed her.

It was only then, when he knew her departure was inevitable, that he realized he did not want her to go. He didn't like the thought of her traveling around the countryside alone. If something happened, who would know it? It wasn't that he particularly cared what happened to her; why should he? But, still. He hadn't jumped into that bloody bear pit just so she could die a few months later. She had gotten him here safely, and now she should have a safe journey out in return. He would provide her with armor, decent armor instead of the cheap sheet metal she wore now. And perhaps a fresh sword.

The way forward dawned on him at last. He could give her his sword. Valyrian steel, probably the finest sword in Westeros, along with its twin. His father had only let him keep it because he had known it would torment him. And it did. He couldn't fight with it like he once would have been able to. The sword was a mockery, a superior weapon in the hands of an inferior man. It was but an adornment against his fine armor, as if he were playing the role of knight instead of actually serving as one. He could wear the uniform, hold the sword in his hand, but when it came down to it, he had failed at every oath he had taken. He was nothing more than the kingslayer, and now a one handed one at that. He was a sham.

The sword deserved someone who would know how to use it, and fight with it well. He chanced a glance at Brienne, her face aglow in the stars, her cropped hair tucked behind her ears, and his decision was made. He would gift the sword to her as soon as the armor was made, and then he would let her go.

"Don't worry about my sister, Lady Brienne, and start planning for your journey." He stood up abruptly, ignoring the look of confusion she gave him in response. He eyes really were striking, the blue of the morning set against a dark sky. Perhaps he would have her armor cast in blue, to match those piercing eyes. "It is dark tonight, wench. You'd better walk back with me." He held out his good arm in a play at chivalry. It got him an eye roll in return, which felt like a rewarding enough payoff. Brienne ran a finger down her sword.

"As if you could protect me besides," she responded, half laughing. But it was playful, instead of mocking, and she let him lead her up the stairs all the same.


End file.
